How many apps?

This point from the Twitter stream of EdCampSWO resonates with me.

How thoughtful are you about choosing apps for use with your students?

Do you choose apps that support the “C’s” in a technology enabled learning environment: Communicate, Collaborate, Create, Citizenship, Critical Questioning/Answering? Perhaps your app choices facilitate inquiry or project based learning.

Where do you stand on app selection? How many is too many? What do you use as app selection criteria? I would be interested to know your ideas on this. Please comment or get in touch via @markwcarbone on Twitter or +markwcarbone on Google +.

~Mark

One thought on “How many apps?”

I find an app that mimics the functionality of a mobile-friendly web service to be a little silly. This is especially true when it cripples functionality or reduces the accessibility (I can zoom on your site, but not in your app?). If they provide a much better interface than the web version then it might be worth installing if it’s frequently used, even if it reduces functionality (see Google Drive for iOS as an example).

Apps are valuable when they allow you to store products (e.g. a video or image) on the device in a helpful way, when they provide useful notifications (I like to be notified when someone tweets at me, and accessing Twitter through Safari won’t help me here), or when they work in utter the absence of an Internet connection (this is important!).

I don’t have a clear framework, and I haven’t done this with students yet, but remembering that the apps serve the learners instead of the other way around should be a good strong guideline.

Thanks Mark!